


Tropic of Cancer

by sevenfists



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Established Relationship, Multi, Polyamory, Vacation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-16
Updated: 2018-08-16
Packaged: 2019-06-23 13:10:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15606999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevenfists/pseuds/sevenfists
Summary: Two and a half months wasn’t long. They would video chat, the way they had last summer. Sid would come back to Pittsburgh with a tan, a suitcase full of weird Nova Scotian souvenirs, and an extra ten pounds from his summer training, and he would move right back into Zhenya’s house, where he belonged. There was no need for Zhenya to feel so surly about it.





	Tropic of Cancer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [saintroux](https://archiveofourown.org/users/saintroux/gifts).



> Thank you to sparcck for looking over multiple drafts of this and saving my bacon!

Zhenya woke from his nap on the couch and knew at once that he was alone in the condo. It was too quiet. Nikita wasn’t a particularly noisy child, but someone was always talking to him or playing with him or laughing at his antics, and instead the condo was silent and still. Zhenya found a note on the kitchen counter in Anya’s handwriting: _At the pool_ and a few scribbled hearts.

He went out on the balcony to look for them. They were all three in the water: Anya in her red bikini, and Sid in the hat and sunglasses he hoped would prevent anyone from recognizing him. Nikita paddled around between them in his arm floaties. Zhenya could see Anya laughing. 

His heart swelled with a familiar feeling, so big it became painful as Sid looked up and spotted him and raised his arm to wave. Zhenya waved back. He and Anya had tickets to Moscow in a week, and he had already begun missing Sid and feeling nostalgic about this time in Miami, their perfect month together when Zhenya could pretend everything was settled and easy.

As he watched, Anya and Sid waded out of the pool and began gathering their things, getting ready to come back up. It was time for Nikita’s afternoon nap.

Zhenya waited for them at the front door as they emerged from the elevator and came down the hall, Sid with the cooler in one hand and the beach bag slung over his shoulder, refusing as always to let Anya carry anything at all. Sid and Anya were smiling at each other, and Sid was holding Nikita’s hand, because Nikita was stuck to him like a burr lately. Nikita had gotten firmly attached, maybe more than they had expected, because Sid liked children, and Anya liked having the extra help and encouraged him.

The feeling in Zhenya’s chest was hot and sticky, like his heart had softened and was clinging to his ribs. He wanted exactly this forever.

“You left me,” Zhenya called as soon as they were in earshot. He wished they had woken him. There were times he wondered—guilty, because he knew it was ridiculous—if they both preferred each other over him. 

Nikita pulled away from Sid and broke into a trot, saying, “Papa, papa,” his arms extended at his sides because he was still wearing his floaties. He was in a phase of not wanting to be carried or pushed in his stroller; every outing was conducted at toddler speed. But he could move fast when he felt like it.

Zhenya bent to scoop him up and kiss his damp hair, towel-dried and sticking up in tufts: his tiny baby, not so tiny anymore. “Did you have fun, little rabbit?”

“Yeah,” Nikita said. He leaned his head against Zhenya’s shoulder and rubbed at his eyes. 

“He’s ready for his nap,” Anya said. Her cover-up had slid down, baring one tanned shoulder. Zhenya ducked to kiss her right there. Her skin was warm from the sun. She smiled at him and went up on her toes to kiss his mouth, and then said, “Here, give him to me, I’ll go put him to bed.”

Zhenya surrendered the baby and took the cooler from Sid instead, and patted Sid on the ass as Sid went ahead of him into the condo. Sid turned to give him a glare that looked more pleased than angry. He loved being casually manhandled, and Zhenya never hesitated to take full advantage.

“You finish?” Zhenya asked, following Sid into the living room. He put the cooler on the breakfast bar and opened it up to inspect the contents. They hadn’t even touched the sandwiches he’d made that morning, before his unscheduled nap. “No, you don’t eat any!”

“Nikita ate his,” Sid said. “And I’ll eat mine now.” He went out onto the balcony to hang the towels over the railing to dry. Zhenya watched through the open door as Sid stripped out of his trunks and hung them up, too: his latest strategy in the face of Anya’s scolding about sitting on the furniture in his wet swimsuit. With Anya in her bikini most of the time and Sid roaming around casually naked, Zhenya existed in a constant state of physical and spiritual torment.

Sid sauntered back into the condo and took the sandwich from Zhenya’s unresisting grasp. His ass and thighs were three shades paler than the rest of him, and his shoulders were faintly pink, because he always let Anya handle his sunscreen and she was more interested in groping him than in actually covering the full acreage. He settled on a stool at the bar and unwrapped his sandwich, just sitting there with his dick out while he ate his turkey and mustard. Zhenya wasn’t sure Sid’s bare ass on the furniture was any better than his wet trunks, but he wasn’t in charge and didn’t question these things.

“You still plan to go fishing tomorrow?” Sid asked through a huge mouthful of sandwich. “I’ll stay with Nikita if Anna wants to go out on the boat.”

“Maybe no,” Zhenya said. When they were planning this trip, when Sid finally agreed after weeks of talking about it, a month in Miami seemed like an unimaginable luxury, an endless stretch of uninterrupted time together, no hockey to think about and nowhere to go unless they wanted to. But now, three quarters of the way through, Zhenya was all too aware of how few days they had left. Sid would go back to Canada, and they wouldn’t see him again until September. 

“Suit yourself,” Sid said with a shrug, and took another bite.

Two and a half months wasn’t long. They would video chat, the way they had last summer. Sid would come back to Pittsburgh with a tan, a suitcase full of weird Nova Scotian souvenirs, and an extra ten pounds from his summer training, and he would move right back into Zhenya’s house, where he belonged. There was no need for Zhenya to feel so surly about it.

It wasn’t like last summer, though. Then, things with Sid had been new enough that there was no question of him giving up his usual routines. But Sid had spent most of the season living with them, only going home a few times a week to check his mail, and Zhenya hated to be parted from him. He was used to having Sid around. He loved the attention and the sex, and how affectionate Sid was with Nikita, and how gentle he was with Anya.

Zhenya sat down beside Sid at the counter and rifled through the cooler until he found the sandwich he had made for himself, cheese with salami and mayo. He still thought North American sandwiches involved too much bread, but he had to admit they were easier to pack.

Down the hall, he could hear Anya singing a lullaby to Nikita, the same one someone sang to him every time he went to sleep. Even Sid had memorized the words. 

“Hey,” Sid said. He leaned over and pressed a smacking kiss to Zhenya’s shoulder. “You okay? You’ve been quiet lately.”

Zhenya had been planning this conversation for days, rehearsing it in the shower, waiting for the perfect moment to bring it up. Now that it had arrived, he wasn’t sure what to say. But Anya was counting on him; he had promised her he would talk to Sid about it.

“Geno?” Sid said, after a moment, when Zhenya hadn’t replied.

It wasn’t so complicated. He was only afraid of how Sid would respond. “You know, we go back to Russia soon.”

Sid lowered his sandwich. “Well, yeah.”

Zhenya reached up to wipe a smear of mustard from the corner of Sid’s mouth. He hadn’t expected this love to feel so necessary or fragile. “You want to come?”

Sid gave up on the sandwich altogether and set it down on the aluminum foil it had been wrapped in. “You want me to go to Moscow with you?”

Sid had a good poker face when he wanted to, the product of so many years spent talking to the media. Zhenya couldn’t tell what he thought about the idea. “It’s long summer, you know. I know you go home now, but maybe you come to Moscow soon, maybe next month. We work out, eat good food, it’s good time.”

“I don’t want to, like. Take up all your time this summer,” Sid said. “I know going home is important to you.” He was jiggling one knee beneath the bar, the same way he did when a reporter was pushing him on something he didn’t want to talk about.

“You don’t take up,” Zhenya said. “We’re happy if you come.” As if he would ever get tired of having Sid around. He thought they had cleared that up in all of the (endless) discussions about Miami and couldn’t imagine why Sid was still worrying about it.

“I don’t know,” Sid said. He looked down at his sandwich, and then out the window toward the balcony. “What does Anna think about this?”

“What I think about what?” Anya asked, coming into the room, long and tan in her bikini. She had let down her hair from the high lopsided knot she had wrapped it into for the pool, probably because Nikita loved to tug at it until it fell apart. Zhenya’s three-year campaign of shameless text message courtship had been worth every bit of mockery from his friends, because now she was his.

“Me coming to Moscow this summer,” Sid said. “You know anything about this?”

“Yeah, it’s my idea,” Anya said calmly. She wedged herself between them at the bar and inspected each of their sandwiches in turn, ignoring Sid’s nudity. “Where’s mine?”

“Cooler,” Sid said. He put one hand on Anya’s ass and patted her a few times. She leaned into him, and his arm slid around her, tucking her against his side.

“Let’s eat,” Anya said. She took her sandwich from the cooler and unwrapped it: cream cheese and cucumbers. She was never worried, because Sid adored her and was sweet with her in a way Zhenya craved and didn’t know how to ask for. 

When Anya had finished eating, she gathered the discarded aluminum foil and took the cooler into the kitchen. Alone, Sid leaned over and kissed Zhenya’s ear until Zhenya slumped into him and buried his face in Sid’s neck. 

“What’s going on with you?” Sid said. He had mustard in the corner of his mouth again.

“Nothing,” Zhenya muttered into Sid’s warm neck. He smelled like chlorine. 

“If you say so,” Sid said, and he sounded so dubious that Zhenya had to smile despite his sour feelings. 

“Sid, where’s your pants?” Anya asked, coming back out of the kitchen. “Why you take off?”

“You told me to quit sitting on the couch in my wet trunks,” Sid protested. “I’m just following orders.”

Anya made a disapproving sound, but she was smiling. She wrapped her arms around Sid’s neck and kissed his cheek. “Sid. Come to Moscow. Okay? You want to?”

“I don’t know if I should,” Sid said. He glanced over at Zhenya. “I’m sure you guys want some time alone.”

“Hmm,” Anya said. She pulled back to give Sid a look of deep skepticism., which was fully warranted, because they had already spent a considerable amount of time convincing Sid that he wasn’t an interloper or a guest. “You think?”

“I guess not,” Sid said. He leaned forward and braced his forearms on the bar top, his upper back rounded as he avoided looking at either of them. 

“Sid,” Zhenya said. This was ridiculous. How many more stupid objections was he going to come up with? What was actually going on here? “You don’t want to come?”

Sid bent closer to the counter and took a deep breath. “Nikita, uh. He called me ‘papa’ the other day when I was putting him down for his nap.” He scraped his thumbnail against a seam in the laminate. “I thought at first that he was asking for Geno, but. He wasn’t. And that’s a lot, right? Should we be letting him do that?”

Zhenya’s shoulders unknotted. Sid didn’t want out; he wasn’t having second thoughts. He was only worrying about the same things he always did.

Zhenya met Anya’s eyes over Sid’s hunched back. They had talked about this a lot over the past few months, as it became clear what was happening, but they hadn’t been able to reach any firm decisions about what to do, largely because it depended on what Sid wanted.

“I don’t want him to get the wrong idea,” Sid went on. “Guess I was at your house too much this season.” He turned his head to look at Anya, facing away from Zhenya. “I didn’t want to be anywhere else.”

“Oh, Sid,” Anya said. Zhenya saw her hand curl around Sid’s shoulder, drawing him toward her. “Why it’s wrong idea? Don’t you take care? Nikita loves you. We say when we start, you’re like Max, like—” She stopped, and peered at Zhenya.

“Godfather,” Zhenya said, there to translate and for no other reason. Sid never turned to him first.

“Yeah,” Anya said. “But it’s okay if we change, you know? It’s okay if you want more.” She rubbed his shoulder. “Or you don’t, that’s okay, too.”

“I do want that,” Sid said. He drew a shaky breath. “It’s okay with you?”

“Zhenya and I talk about lots,” Anya said. “And you say—you want to stay with us always. So I think it’s okay. I know you only do what’s best for Nikita.”

“I always will,” Sid said. “I’ll try.”

Anya leaned in to kiss his face. “We don’t decide now. Maybe you come to Moscow this summer, maybe not, it’s okay.”

“I’d like to,” Sid said, and finally, finally turned his head to look at Zhenya. “Sorry I, uh. I know you’re sick of talking about this.”

“You worry so much, that’s all,” Zhenya said, a hypocrite full of his own worries. “You need to talk, it’s fine.” 

“Okay,” Sid said. He sat up and rolled his shoulders a couple of times. His bad posture was catching up with him now, in his old age: nearly thirty-one. “We’ll think about it.”

“Okay,” Anya said. She kissed Sid again, briskly: on to the next thing, now that the matter had been settled. “I need to change. Sid, you want pants?”

“Sure, okay, bring me some pants,” Sid said, grinning, and they both watched Anya’s ass as she went off down the hall.

When she was out of sight, Sid hopped off his stool and turned Zhenya’s around to face him, and wedged himself between Zhenya’s thighs. There was so much of him, pale and freckled. Zhenya touched him without intending to, his hands drawn to Sid’s shoulders, pinker now as his sunburn set in.

“Hey,” Sid said. He put both hands on Zhenya’s neck and kissed him gently, again and again until Zhenya let his eyes close and his mouth open, tasting the mustard on Sid’s tongue. Sid pulled back and kissed his cheek. “G, I love you.”

Zhenya warily opened his eyes. Sid was watching him with the tenderest expression imaginable, soft eyes and softer smile, and there was the sticky feeling again: that fond look turned on Zhenya for once, everything he wanted.

“Are you upset about—I should have told you guys sooner,” Sid said. “But it only happened a couple of days ago. And I guess I was. I was pretty happy about it. And then I felt guilty, so. But I’m not trying to, like. Take your place.”

That was the last thing in the world Zhenya was worried about. He sighed and leaned into Sid and closed his eyes again as he felt Sid’s arms slide around his waist. “Sid. You worry about you don’t belong with us. It’s just hard, okay? I worry sometimes—” It was embarrassing to admit. He forced himself to say it. “I worry you like Anya more. I know it’s stupid. But it’s three of us, you know—it’s still new. We figure out.”

“Geno, what the fuck,” Sid said, squeezing him tight. Zhenya kept his face stubbornly buried in Sid’s shoulder. “I don’t _like Anna better_. God.” He shook Zhenya a little. “It’s just easier with her, you know? I know how to act with her. But with you, it’s like. I’m still figuring it out. Like you just make faces at me half the time. I know I’m not any good at it. But I love you a lot. I really do.”

Zhenya’s heart melted into a warm slurry. He kissed Sid’s shoulder, warm with sunburn, still smelling like the pool. “It’s fine,” he said. “How you do.” He was embarrassed by what he wanted from Sid; he was still learning to let himself accept it. He slid his hands down to palm Sid’s ass. “Let’s go fish tomorrow. Just us. Anya can keep baby.”

Sid pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “We’ll do some stuff together. If I come to Moscow. Go to the banya.”

“Sid,” Zhenya said. He sat up and looked Sid in the eye. Sid’s face was pink. It might have been sunburn. Zhenya said, “Please come. Nikita will miss you, but I miss you most.”

Sid laughed and ducked his head. “You think so, eh?”

“I know,” Zhenya said. He squeezed Sid’s ass. They probably had some time before Nikita woke up.

“We’ll see,” Sid said, smiling, and it sounded to Zhenya like a firm _yes_.


End file.
